Rarely can the General Medical Council have been given a better opportunity to demonstrate it recognises the moral dilemma facing doctors dealing with terminally ill patients than in its recent hearings on Dr Michael Irwin, a retired doctor and euthanasia campaigner.

Dr Irwin, who was medical director of the United Nations in New York before he retired 15 years ago, was summoned to a two-day hearing after the GMC learned he had tried, but failed, to help a retired farmer friend to die. The friend, a fellow euthanasia campaigner, was suffering from terminal prostate cancer. While 13 out of 14 people with prostate cancer die with it, rather than from it, to die from it can be extremely painful. Dr Irwin, aged 74, travelled from his Surrey home to the Isle of Man with 60 Temazepam sleeping pills, but by the time he reached his friend's home, the farmer was too ill to take the pills and died in a coma.

Undeterred, the GMC pressed ahead with its hearing where Dr Irwin explained that several doctors have "twinning" arrangements with fellow medics to help each other commit suicide if a painful death threatens. As he noted: "If physicians are willing to help each other at the end of life, surely they are guilty of applying double standards if they do not extend that privilege to their terminally ill patients or close friends." True to earlier tradition, the GMC opted for upholding hypocrisy rather than the Hippocratic oath. This courageous medic deserved better. He should not be "struck off".